Georges Guynemer: Knight of the Air Part 12

Guynemer was delighted, and when the party broke up he went out with the gentleman who had said this and thanked him warmly. "Don't you see how little they understand? I don't say I am modest, but if I weren't I would be a fool, and I should not like to be that. I know quite well that just now some of us are getting so much admiration and so many honors that one may get more than one's share. Whereas the men in the trenches--how different it is with them!"[24]

[Footnote 24: _Journal des Debats_ for September 26, 1917.]

But it was inevitable that he should be lionized. People came to him with alb.u.ms and pictures. He wrote to his father that a Madame de B.

wanted something, just one sentence, in an alb.u.m which was to be sold in America. "I am to be alongside the Generalissimo. What on earth can I write?"

An American lady who was also a guest at the Hotel Edouard VII wanted to have at any price some souvenir of the young hero. She ordered her maid to bring away an old glove of Guynemer's which was lying on a chest of drawers, and replace it by a magnificent bouquet. "This lady put me in a nice dilemma," Guynemer explained, "as it was Sunday and there was no way of getting any more gloves."[25]

[Footnote 25: Anecdote related in the _Figaro_ for September 29, 1917.]

He had no affectation, least of all the kind that pretends to be ignorant of one's own popularity; but surely he cared little for popularity. Here again he puts us in mind of a medieval poem. In _Gilbert de Metz_, one of our oldest epics, the daughter of Anseis is described seated at the window, "fresh, slim, and white as a lily" when two knights, Garin and his cousin Gilbert, happen to ride near. "Look up, cousin Gilbert," says Garin, "look. By our lady, what a handsome dame!" "Oh," answers Gilbert, "what a handsome creature my steed is! I never saw anything so lovely as this maiden with her fair skin and dark eyes. I never knew any steed that could compare with mine." And so on, while Gilbert still refuses to look up at the beautiful daughter of Anseis. Also in _Girard de Viane_, Charlemagne, holding his court at the palace of Vienne, has just placed the hand of the lovely Aude in that of his nephew Roland. Both the girl and the great soldier are silent and blushing while the date of the wedding is being discussed, when a messenger suddenly rushes in: "The Saracens are in France! War!

war!" shout the bystanders. Then without a word Roland drops the white hand of the girl, springs to arms, and is gone. So Guynemer would have praised his Nieuport or his Spad as Gilbert praised his steed, and _belle Aude_ herself could not have kept him away from the fight.

[Ill.u.s.tration: COMBAT]

One day his father felt doubts about the capacity of such a young man to resist the intoxication of so much flattery from men and women.

"Don't worry," Guynemer answered, "I am watching my nerves as an acrobat watches his muscles. I have chosen my own mission, and I must fulfil it."

After his death, one of his friends, the one who spoke to him last, told me: "He used to put aside heaps of flattering letters which he did not even read. 'Read them if you like,' he said to me, and I destroyed them.

He only read letters from children, schoolboys and soldiers."

In _L'Aiglon_ Prokesch brings the mail to the Prince Imperial, and handing him letters from women, he says:

Voila Ce que c'est d'avoir l'aureole fatale.

As soon as Prokesch begins to read them, the Prince stops him with the words: "_Je dechire_." Even when a woman whom he has nicknamed "Little Spring"--"because the water sleeping in her eyes or purling in her voice has often cooled his fever"--announces her departure, hoping he may detain her, he lets her go, whispering again like a refrain, "_Je dechire_."

Did Guynemer deal with hearts as he dealt with the besieging letters, or as the falcon of St. Jean l'Hospitalier dealt with birds?--No "Little Spring," had her voice been ever so rill-like, could have detained him when a sunny morning invited him skywards.

Safe from the admiring public, Guynemer would relax and breathe freely with his people at Compiegne, where he became once more a lively, noisy, indulged, but coaxing and charming boy, except when absorbed in work, from which nothing could distract him. He spent hours in pasting and cla.s.sifying the snapshots he took of his enemies just before pulling the trigger of his machine-gun and bringing them down. One of his greatest pleasures when on leave was to arrange and show these photographs.

His eyes, which saw everything, were keen to detect the least changes in the arrangement of his home, even when mere knickknacks had been moved about. At each visit he found the house ornamented with some new trophy of his exploits. He was delighted to find that a miniature barkentine, which he had built with corks, paper, and thread when he was seven years old, still stood on his mother's mantelpiece. Even at that age his powers of observation had been evident, and he had forgotten no detail of sails or rigging.

He had taken again so naturally his old place in the family circle that his mother forgot once and called the tall, famous young man by his old familiar name, "_Bebe_." She quickly corrected herself, but he said:

"I am always that to you, Mother."

"I was happier when you were little," she observed.

"I hope you are not vexed with me, Mother."

"Vexed for what?"

"For having grown up."

He was naturally full of the one subject that interested him, airplanes and chasing, and he would go round the house collecting audiences.

Strange bits of narration could be overheard from different rooms as he held forth:

"Then I _embusqued_ myself became a slacker...."

"What!"

"Oh! I _embusqued_ myself behind a cloud."

Or, "The light dazzled me, so I hid the sun with my wing."

He never forgot his sisters' birthdays, but he could not always give them the present he preferred. "Sorry I could not present you with a Boche."

He was hardly different when his mother received company: he was never seen to play the great man. Only on one subject he always and instantly became serious, namely, when the future was mentioned. "Do not let us make any plans," he would say.

A page from one of my own notebooks will help to show Guynemer as I used to see him in his home.

_Wednesday, June 27, 1917._--Compiegne. Called on the Guynemers. He is fascination itself with his "G.o.ddess on the clouds" gait--as if he remembered when walking that he could also fly--with his incomparable eyes, his perpetual movement, his interior electricity, his admixture of elegance and ardor, and with that impulse of his whole being towards one object which suggests the antique runner, even when he is for an instant in repose. His parents and sisters do not miss a single gesture, a single motion he makes. They drink in his every word, and his life seems to absorb them. His laugh echoes in their souls. They believe in him, are sure of him, sure of his future, and that all will be well.

Noticing this cert.i.tude, whether real or a.s.sumed, I could not help stealing a glance at the frail G.o.d of aviation, made like the delicate statuettes that we dread breaking. He talks pa.s.sionately, as usual, of his aerial fights. But just now one thought seems to supersede every other. He is expecting a new machine, a magic machine which he planned long ago, found difficult to get built, and with which he must do more damage than ever.

Then he showed us his photographs with the white blotches of bursting sh.e.l.ls, or the gray wings of German airplanes. One of these is seen as it falls in flames, the pilot falling, too, some distance away from it. Thus the victim was registered, and the memory of it made him happy.

I swallowed a question I was going to ask: What about yourself--some day? because he looked so full of life that the notion of death could never present itself to him. But he seemed to have read my thoughts, for he said:

"You have plenty of time in the air, except when you fight, and then you have no time at all. I've been brought down six times, and I always had plenty of time to realize what was happening." And he laughed his clear, boyish laugh.

As a matter of fact, he has been incredibly lucky. In one fight he was. .h.i.t three times, and each time the bullet was deadened by some unexpected obstacle.

Finally I was shown photographs of himself, chronologically arranged. Needless to say, it was not he who showed them. There was the half-nude baby, with eyes already sparkling and eager, then the schoolboy with the fine carriage of the head, then the lad fresh from school with a singularly calm expression, and well filled-out cheeks. A little later the expression appeared more mature and tense, though still ingenuous. Later again there was a decidedly stern look, with the face less oval and thinner. The rough fingers of war had chiseled this face, and sharpened and strengthened it. I looked from the picture to him, and I realized that, compared to his former pictures, his expression had now indeed acquired something terrible. But just then he laughed, and the laughter conjured away all phantasies.

V. THE MAGIC MACHINE

As a tiny boy who had invented an enchanted bed for his sisters' dolls, as a boy who, at College Stanislas, had rigged up a telephone to send messages to the last forms in the schoolroom, or manufactured miniature airplanes, as a recruit who, at Pau, had gladly accepted the work of cleaning, burnishing, and overhauling engines, Guynemer had always shown a pa.s.sion for mechanics. Becoming a pilot, and later on a chaser, he exhibited in the study and perfecting of his airplanes the same enthusiasm and perseverance as in his flights. He was everlastingly calling for swifter or more powerful machines, and not only strove to communicate his own fervor to technicians, but went into minute details, suggested improvements, and whenever he had a chance visited the workshops and a.s.sisted at trials. Such trials are sometimes dangerous.

One of his friends, Edouard de Layens, was killed in this kind of accident, and Guynemer was enraged that a gallant airman should perish otherwise than in battle. He was in reality an inventor, though this statement may cause surprise, and though it may not be wise at present to bear it out by facts.

Every part of his machine or of his gun was familiar to him. He had handled them all, taking them apart and putting them together again.

There are practical improvements in modern airplanes which would not be there had it not been for him. And there is a "Guynemer visor."

Confidence and authoritativeness had not come to him along with glory, for from the first he talked as one engrossed by his ideas, and it is because he was thus engrossed that he found persuasive words to bring others round to his views. But, naturally enough, he had not at first the prestige which he possessed when he became Captain Guynemer, had high rank in the Legion of Honor, and enjoyed world-wide fame. In his 'prentice days when, in workshops or in the presence of well-known builders, he would make confident statements, inveigh against errors, or demand modifications, people thought him flippant and saucy. Once somebody called him a raw lad. The answer came with crushing rapidity: "When you blunder, raw lads like myself pay for your mistakes."

It must be admitted that, like most people brought up with wealth, he was apt to be unduly impatient. Delays or objections irritated him. He wanted to force his will upon Time, which never admits compulsion, and tried to over-ride obstacles. His peculiar fascination gradually won its way even in workshops, and his appearance there was greeted with acclamation, not only because the men were curious to see him, but because they were in sympathy with him and had put his ideas to a successful test. The workmen liked to see him sit in a half-finished machine, and explain in his short, decisive style what he wanted and what was sure to give superiority to French aviation. The men stopped work, came round, and listened eagerly. This, too, was a triumph for him. What he told them on such occasions he had probably whispered to himself many times before when, on rainy days, he would sit in his airplane under the hangar, and think and talk to himself, while strangers wondered if he was not crazy.

However, he had made friends with well-known engineers, especially Major Garnier of Puteaux and M. Bechereau of the Spad works. These two, instead of dismissing him as a snappish airman continually at variance with the builder, took his inventions seriously and strove to meet his requirements. When M. Bechereau, after long delays, was at last decorated for his eminent services, the Secretary of Aeronautics, M.

Daniel Vincent, came to the works and was going to place the medal and red ribbon on the engineer's breast, when he saw Guynemer standing near.

He graciously handed the medal over to the airman, saying:

"Give M Bechereau his decoration; it is only fair you should."